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I hate some of the fanboys in here who defend apple.

Macbook cracks? my fault
Macbook wifi promblem? my fault
Macbook charger cable melts and nearly burns down my house? my fault

:rolleyes:
Apple's quality control has REALLY slipped in the last couple years and along with it, so has their customer services. I mean even the 2nd gen iPhones cant compare to the quality of last years ones. Infact im even tempted to go back to using my old one...
Its ironic that the iPhone is the "windows" of the mobile phone world, in that it crashes every so often with no explanation, and requires a restart all the damn time.
 
Defense of Matticus008

I work in retail and strongly agree with matticus.
Consumers are mercenaries. They want perfect goods for peanuts. Not going to happen! Everything is made to tolerances.
Nobody seems to have mentioned that there is actually an international document (ISO standard) covering LCD panels and acceptable levels of defects. All companies are within their rights to claim a product is "within specs" if it complies with the standard.

So matticus you have at least one ally out here. Yes dead pixels are annoying, but they are a fact that has very clear definition in the ISO standard. As stated by other posters, people need to be reasonable and just chill.
 
First off don't deal with those Retail Apple Reps, they have never helped me with this sort of an issue. Besides, there is a reason you have 1 year of AppleCare on new computers from Apple.

I think this would be a good reason to call AppleCare. I know they are much better to deal with than their store employees.

I have an older PowerBook G4 that has been fixed by AppleCare techs 4 times in the last two months. The first time i paid to have the Motherboard replaced due to a dead Airport socket. When i got it back, i had a yellowish display, and my backlit keyboard only partly worked, so i returned it; no problem. Next, it was a dead HD. Returned. Then, it was dead pixels on the newly replaced Display. So, i called once again, and complained.

So now i am on my 3rd Display, and my computer has technically been refurbished because its been in so many times. Hopefully, my friend has better luck with it, as i just sold it to him for $400.
 
I hate some of the fanboys in here who defend apple.

Macbook cracks? my fault
Macbook wifi promblem? my fault
Macbook charger cable melts and nearly burns down my house? my fault

:rolleyes:
Apple's quality control has REALLY slipped in the last couple years and along with it, so has their customer services. I mean even the 2nd gen iPhones cant compare to the quality of last years ones. Infact im even tempted to go back to using my old one...
Its ironic that the iPhone is the "windows" of the mobile phone world, in that it crashes every so often with no explanation, and requires a restart all the damn time.

Totally agree. As for anyone who needs something fixed on there Apple Computer and they won't help you, msg me and I will give you some great advice on how to get around this. I will save from posting it here to avoid the 20 new responses on how it's wrong.
 
Even though most manufactures require 8 pixels to consider an LCD defective, that standard is for pixels that fail after the sale. Seldom have I seen a stuck pixel on a new LCD. When I did get one, it was replaced under warranty without question. It was a stuck red in the center of the screen, and was impossible to ignore.

As far as apple's policy, I have had pretty bad luck getting them to honor warranty claims, even when it was a very clear cut and dry issue. Send a letter to customer service in Cupertino, politly stating your issue, and that if it is not promply resoved that you will file a suit in small claims. Then follow up by filing the lawsuit. They won't move until you do, but they also don't want to go to court. You will get your screen fixed or iMac replaced.

To me customer service is number one. I love apple computers, but apple is pretty high on my list of hated companys because of past service issues.
 
Even though most manufactures require 8 pixels to consider an LCD defective, that standard is for pixels that fail after the sale. Seldom have I seen a stuck pixel on a new LCD. When I did get one, it was replaced under warranty without question. It was a stuck red in the center of the screen, and was impossible to ignore.

As far as apple's policy, I have had pretty bad luck getting them to honor warranty claims, even when it was a very clear cut and dry issue. Send a letter to customer service in Cupertino, politly stating your issue, and that if it is not promply resoved that you will file a suit in small claims. Then follow up by filing the lawsuit. They won't move until you do, but they also don't want to go to court. You will get your screen fixed or iMac replaced.

To me customer service is number one. I love apple computers, but apple is pretty high on my list of hated companys because of past service issues.

Wow, absolutely unnecessary. Never once have I heard of a lawsuit being necessary to get Apple to take care of an actual warranty issue. If you were being unreasonable from the start or if the problem was one that didn't fall under the warranty, then perhaps you'd have to go to extremes, but generally the best practice if you're having trouble is to take the machine to a AASP, not an Apple Store, if there's one around, or simply to email sjobs@apple.com.

jW
 
Wow, absolutely unnecessary. Never once have I heard of a lawsuit being necessary to get Apple to take care of an actual warranty issue. If you were being unreasonable from the start or if the problem was one that didn't fall under the warranty, then perhaps you'd have to go to extremes, but generally the best practice if you're having trouble is to take the machine to a AASP, not an Apple Store, if there's one around, or simply to email sjobs@apple.com.

jW

In my case it was a macbook, 30 days old and the screen went dark. I was on the phone for a hour before sending it in I never went to an apple store. They called me and told me a chip inside was broken and not covered under the warranty. I don't see how that is possible if it didn't leave the factory that way. The repair was almost as much as a new macbook. I was very friendly and asked how do dispute it. I was told I couldn't. I politely asked to speak with a manager, and was told apple doesn't allow customers to speak with managers, and was instead given their address where I could write if I had a problem. All else aside, that alone is absurd to me.

I wrote them and eventually spoke with a manager, who stood by the original decision. After two months of polite phone calls I gave up and filed the suit. Apple resolved it very quickly after that.

I have no doubt that I would have won if it went to court. I hadn't opened my macbook and there was no indication that I did, other than the twisted chip inside which apparently worked for a short time after leaving the factory. I was polite and attempted to work through apples system, which doesn't have any mechanism for customers to escalate or dispute a claim. If it ever happens to me again, I'm not wasting my time. I'm just going to file.

I am an IT manager and have experience with every computer manufacturer, and have had hardware failures from them all. Apple is the only one to give me so much grief. Dell, HP, and IBM have all shipped replacement hardware to me only after troubleshooting on the phone without even seeing the box themselves.
 
I've bought 2 Macbook pro's and recently a 21.5" imac. I've gone thru 12 machines due to dead pixels.

Dead pixels are unacceptable, whether it's 1 or 100. Whenever I buy new monitors/computers I let them run for a couple days to ensure no dead pixels. If I find one, it is promptly exchanged and Apple has never had an issue with this within the 14 days.

What I find unacceptable of late is their QA. I had 4 iMacs this weekend alone with dead pixels. I am on #5 now. I hope that this one is ok, if not I will be back in swapping it again.

I think most people are ignorant and just accept the dead pixel...well you shouldn't as your Mac will have ZERO resale value.

The fact that dead pixels still happen today in general is embarrassing.
 
The fact that dead pixels still happen today in general is embarrassing.

I think the fact that some of you are complaining about this kind of stuff is embarrassing. Just grow up. I would complain about that kind of stuff when I was 14. I would not think about complaining about such things today.
It is virtually impossible to be perfect for things. Everything comes with flaws. As long as there are no more than a certain amount of pixels, the manufacturer should not be responsible. My screen has about 1.3 million pixels. That is a ton of pixels. Tell me where somebody can produce 1 million + products and not have a tiny mistake in one single product amongst the bunch.
It is people like this that return their electronics for every small little imperfection that drive up prices of electronics. Don't go looking for dead pixels and you won't notice it. A pixel is 7.4X10^-5 inches in area. That is nothing. It is extremely easy to ignore. It is ridiculous that you have gone through 4 computers in one weekend because of dead pixels. Now they can't sell a single one of them as new. You just cost them over a thousand dollars because of your behavior.
 
Ok...and I'll be sure to deal with my 27" iMac's flickering, cracked screen too. Enjoy dealing with mediocrity in your life if that's how you look at things.

Are you going to drive a car that only starts 1 in every 10 tries?



I think the fact that some of you are complaining about this kind of stuff is embarrassing. Just grow up. I would complain about that kind of stuff when I was 14. I would not think about complaining about such things today.
It is virtually impossible to be perfect for things. Everything comes with flaws. As long as there are no more than a certain amount of pixels, the manufacturer should not be responsible. My screen has about 1.3 million pixels. That is a ton of pixels. Tell me where somebody can produce 1 million + products and not have a tiny mistake in one single product amongst the bunch.
It is people like this that return their electronics for every small little imperfection that drive up prices of electronics. Don't go looking for dead pixels and you won't notice it. A pixel is 7.4X10^-5 inches in area. That is nothing. It is extremely easy to ignore. It is ridiculous that you have gone through 4 computers in one weekend because of dead pixels. Now they can't sell a single one of them as new. You just cost them over a thousand dollars because of your behavior.
 
Ok...and I'll be sure to deal with my 27" iMac's flickering, cracked screen too. Enjoy dealing with mediocrity in your life if that's how you look at things.

Are you going to drive a car that only starts 1 in every 10 tries?

That reply makes absolutely no sense. There is something wrong with a flickering display. There is something wrong with a cracked screen. Those are on completely different levels than a stuck pixel.
Where does 1 in every 10 tries come from? We are talking about pixel. 1 pixel in 1+ million pixels is nothing. Same as if I started my car 1 million times. I know that it will not start at least one in one of those million tries. Probably a lot more than once. 1 million is a lot of something and is nowhere on the order of magnitude of 10. I honestly don't think you can properly justify your foolishness.
 
That reply makes absolutely no sense. There is something wrong with a flickering display. There is something wrong with a cracked screen. Those are on completely different levels than a stuck pixel.
Where does 1 in every 10 tries come from? We are talking about pixel. 1 pixel in 1+ million pixels is nothing. Same as if I started my car 1 million times. I know that it will not start every time.

Ok, you try doing graphic design or watching a movie with a spot in the middle of the screen. Once you know it's there it becomes your focus. Apple charges me a premium for their premium product. I expect the hardware to be flawless or replaced.
 
Try doing graphic design work or watch a movie with a dead pixel? Easy. It covers the area of something smaller than a grain of sand. It is inconsequential in our visual field. If you can't design something with a tiny little dot in the way, then it is your fault alone that you can't do it.
What I am saying is you are expecting the impossible. We do not live in a perfect world. I expect that everyone in the world has access to clean water and food. Will it happen? No. I expect that when everyone drives home from Christmas that nobody will get hit by a drunk driver and die. Will that happen? No. Part of maturing is knowing that you can't expect everything in life. There are fundamentally flaws to everything. If I go press 1 million CDs, there are going to be many that are flawed. If I pass 1 million potato chips through a scanner, there are many that are going to go through that are burnt or green.

Also, straight from Apple:
"Rejecting all but perfect LCD panels would significantly increase the retail price for products using LCD displays. These factors apply to all manufacturers using LCD technology--not just Apple products." How does your conscious feel about Apple having to absorb the cost of your unhealthy desire to perfectness? If you have any kids, will you abort them if they have a mole? Because obviously they are not perfect. Will you punish them when they get home from school because they got a 99 on a test and not a 100?
 
Also, straight from Apple:
"Rejecting all but perfect LCD panels would significantly increase the retail price for products using LCD displays. These factors apply to all manufacturers using LCD technology--not just Apple products." How does your conscious feel about Apple having to absorb the cost of your unhealthy desire to perfectness? If you have any kids, will you abort them if they have a mole? Because obviously they are not perfect. Will you punish them when they get home from school because they got a 99 on a test and not a 100?

It is worth saying that there are companies that guarantee near perfection with their products--but they charge a much higher premium than Apple. If you want perfectly tailored suits, or a flawless watch, or a handbag stitched with every single thread in place, you can buy that--but expect to pay many times over the price for an off-the-shelf suit, watch or handbag.
 
It is worth saying that there are companies that guarantee near perfection with their products--but they charge a much higher premium than Apple. If you want perfectly tailored suits, or a flawless watch, or a handbag stitched with every single thread in place, you can buy that--but expect to pay many times over the price for a store-shelf handbag.

But at the same time, these companies are not making millions of these products. Smaller scale operations are very individualized and have the time and opportunity to look at every product they put out. You know a Stratavarius will be flawless because they are being manufactured on a scale hundreds of times less than the LCD screens used in iMacs (which apple doesn't even make).
The LCD screens on the other hand are being made in the millions. The little pixels themselves are being made in the billions! To have 1 billion flawless pixels is impossible.
 
I just took receipt of a new 27" iMac with the i7 quad core processor which I had to buy online as the retail store did not have this customization. As soon as I turned it on I noticed a black dot in the left side of the screen. I took it to the Apple Store and was told because it's one dot it's with in tolerance. The 'Genuis' calculated the amount of pixels the display had and advised that it's normal for some to fail.

I politely advised that it's not within my tolerance to pay $2500 for a display that has such an obvious flaw (I noticed in with a second of looking at the white boot screen)from day one and that had Apple checked; they'd see that a the display was flawed. I then advised that I'm an IT tech and I support hundreds of monitors and that a black pixel is actually very rare (I've seen only a hand full in the last decade). I told them that I understand that pixels may vary slightly in terms of color temperature, luminosity, etc. But to have a dead pixel is to have a clearly defective product. Had I been able to buy this product in store I would have checked it prior to taking it home. I received a product that did not meet my specifications, regardless of industry standards. They advised that they'll replace the display under warranty.
 
Dead pixels are defective products

I just took receipt of a new 27" iMac with the i7 quad core processor which I had to buy online as the retail store did not have this customization. As soon as I turned it on I noticed a black dot in the left side of the screen. I took it to the Apple Store and was told because it's one dot it's with in tolerance. The 'Genuis' calculated the amount of pixels the display had and advised that it's normal for some to fail.

I politely advised that it's not within my tolerance to pay $2500 for a display that has such an obvious flaw (I noticed in with a second of looking at the white boot screen)from day one and that had Apple checked; they'd see that a the display was flawed. I then advised that I'm an IT tech and I support hundreds of monitors and that a black pixel is actually very rare (I've seen only a hand full in the last decade). I told them that I understand that pixels may vary slightly in terms of color temperature, luminosity, etc. But to have a dead pixel is to have a clearly defective product. Had I been able to buy this product in store I would have checked it prior to taking it home. I received a product that did not meet my specifications, regardless of industry standards. They advised that they'll replace the display under warranty.
 
That reply makes absolutely no sense. There is something wrong with a flickering display. There is something wrong with a cracked screen. Those are on completely different levels than a stuck pixel.
Where does 1 in every 10 tries come from? We are talking about pixel. 1 pixel in 1+ million pixels is nothing. Same as if I started my car 1 million times. I know that it will not start at least one in one of those million tries. Probably a lot more than once. 1 million is a lot of something and is nowhere on the order of magnitude of 10. I honestly don't think you can properly justify your foolishness.

Hey, we should be able to return a computer if there is an extra atom in place that shouldn't be there. I don't care if its against policy, they'll be taking mine back if any such problem occurred. Hitler had policies too! Did that mean that people just dealt with it? No! Some people did because they were silly, but most got some guns and shot the Nazis. And thats what needs to happen here.
:apple: will get pew-pew'd
 
Furious about dead pixels

:mad: There is no excuse for having dead pixels in a top of the line computer such as an iMac. I have gone to Sears, Walmart, Best Buy, Kmart, and I am telling you, it is highly.... I mean highly rare when I see a dead pixel on any of the flat TV screens they have on display. Even the huge ones.

I have seen so many lap tops and computers that are not iMacs, and the chances of them having a dead pixel is astronomical, or at least it looks that way.

But when buying an iMac, I go insane! Waiting and crossing my fingers, hoping and praying that the iMac I get will not have any dead pixels.

This, my friends, I S N O T A C C E P T A B L E !

If other cheaper computers have no dead pixels, I expect the iMac to be far, I mean far better than all of those chippi, chappi crap out there.

I mean..... come on!

There is no excuse for this; no excuse at all!
 
:mad: There is no excuse for having dead pixels in a top of the line computer such as an iMac. I have gone to Sears, Walmart, Best Buy, Kmart, and I am telling you, it is highly.... I mean highly rare when I see a dead pixel on any of the flat TV screens they have on display. Even the huge ones.

I have seen so many lap tops and computers that are not iMacs, and the chances of them having a dead pixel is astronomical, or at least it looks that way.

But when buying an iMac, I go insane! Waiting and crossing my fingers, hoping and praying that the iMac I get will not have any dead pixels.

This, my friends, I S N O T A C C E P T A B L E !

If other cheaper computers have no dead pixels, I expect the iMac to be far, I mean far better than all of those chippi, chappi crap out there.

I mean..... come on!

There is no excuse for this; no excuse at all!

OMG!!! WTF!

This problem is so easily solved. Who cares if it is within spec, if you are not satisfied with it, there are ways to get Apple to take it back. :cool::cool::apple::apple:

If you don't like the computer, change your mind or have a problem they may not allow you to return it for, just break something. Crack the screen, bend the stand, something like that. Then call Apple and say it came to you're house damaged and they will send another.

Even if you think there is a chance Apple will take it back for something like a stuck pixel, don't chance it. Break the computer and they will give you another. :D:D
 
Go with your credit card

I have disputed the same exact issue with my Mastercard Platinum. People who fear chargebacks have shoddy credit or a shoddy credit card company.

What I did:
Stuck pixel, contacted apple, they wouldn't fix it.
Tried again, documented call, rep, case #.
called CC company, enacted their "if you don't like it" policy
They resolved the problem and I got a new imac without a stuck pixel.

As long as your card agreement protects you from defective products, you're fine. If you're at all worried, ask your credit card CSR for the process and if there are any ramifications.
 
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